If We Had Followed Through

I was sifting through my inbox when I chanced upon this series of emails sent by The Sister. They date to about 4 years back. Attached to these emails were photos of random church people gathering in familiar homes, some scribbling at their bibles, some talking and gesturing, others just looking cosy. Right. The 40 day PDL Campaign. We were supposed to weave the photos into some sort of video collage.

Now, my church is like this lego toy. There's the kids block, the youth block, the young adults block, the not-so-young young adults block, the adults block, the old block and the really old block, which also happens to be the really big block. The good thing is that there is integrity. The bad thing is that there is no integration.

That's why I immediately wondered why we didn't continue with cell groups. It's quite surprising actually because most churches do employ the system of cell groups at a church-level. And they worked at that time, evidently from the photos, but only for as long as they were there. It sounds like a simple question, but I doubt those who decided then would be able to answer my question now. We don't have that many lay-shepherds now to do it, but we would have more if we didn't stop then.

We must have missed the point when we ran the campaign 4 years ago. The model for fellowship (or worship, or missions, or anything else) was certainly not something to be completed, fulfilled or finished in any sense within 40 days. At least not in the way we celebrated it as if it were the culmination of some great spiritual awakening. 40 days was in fact the time given to kick-start a biblical and practical way of running a church that should last for as long as the people believe in it. How grave it is a mistake to mistake an end for a beginning!

I know a church which does this thing called 'Lifegroup'. Basically, at whatever age, you're thrown into a cell group of people around your age and you have meetings with that group for pretty much the rest of your life, hence Lifegroup. This system has its weaknesses, but the level of accountability you can expect to be nurtured from that is just amazing. We are nowhere near that, and dangerously so.

I think we have brought many people in, but we haven't made many people feel at home. That's why they tend to exit where they entered. A house is a building, and a home is a house with people in it. The house of God must be the home of His bride. We don't do marriages in churches for no reason. And that's also the purpose of ascribing locality to an omnipresent being. If even I feel this way, I speculate at what those who just came in through the door are thinking.

Imagine, if we had followed through, we might be home. 4 years is a long time. There might be a harvest now. At the very least, we won't have to be so afraid of our new neighbours at Buona Vista.